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(Scott Horton is on vacation. This interview is from the Antiwar Radio archives and was originally broadcast on July 23, 2008)

Pat Buchanan, political analyst, columnist and author of Churchill, Hitler and the Unnecessary War: How Britain Lost Its Empire and the West Lost the World, discusses the British politicians’ colossal blunders that led them into World War I and II and the collapse of their empire, the consequences of American intervention in WWI and imposition of the Versailles Treaty, Hitler’s motive to regain the lands lost in the east and willingness to forsake former German provinces in the west out of his desire to avoid war with England and France, what really happened at Munich, the folly of the British war guarantee to Poland during their dispute with Hitler over Danzig and the real lessons of the second World War.

Pat Buchanan is an American politician, author, syndicated columnist and broadcaster. Buchanan was a senior adviser to American presidents, Nixon, Ford and Reagan, and was an original host on CNN’s Crossfire. He sought the Republican presidential nomination in 1992 and 1996. He ran on the Reform Party ticket in the 2000 presidential election. He co-founded The American Conservative magazine and launched a foundation named The American Cause. He has been published in Human Events, National Review, The Nation and Rolling Stone. His new book is called Churchill, Hitler, and The Unnecessary War: How Britain Lost Its Empire and the West Lost the World.

Actually, I would say that Chamberlain hoped to get the USSR and Germany to destroy each other. The Poles were the ones who dashed those hopes, as they steadfastly refused to have anything to do with being an ally of Uncle Joe Stalin. The Soviets, on the other hand, while possibly going along with Chamberlain under the right circumstances, saw their best bet lying in fomenting a bloody, exhausting war between the plutocrats (i.e., France and Britain) and the Germans while secretly mobilizing the largest military force in human history to make an attack on the exhausted European powers. Therefore, Uncle Joe directed Molotov to sign away on the treaty with Ribbentrop.

Actually, I would say that Chamberlain hoped to get the USSR and Germany to destroy each other. The Poles were the ones who dashed those hopes, as they steadfastly refused to have anything to do with being an ally of Uncle Joe Stalin. The Soviets, on the other hand, while possibly going along with Chamberlain under the right circumstances, saw their best bet lying in fomenting a bloody, exhausting war between the plutocrats (i.e., France and Britain) and the Germans while secretly mobilizing the largest military force in human history to make a surprise attack on the exhausted European powers. Therefore, Uncle Joe directed Molotov to sign away on the treaty with Ribbentrop.

The Soviets, on the other hand,… while secretly mobilizing the largest military force in human history… <<<<
This speculation simply did not make any sense. Russians were not prepared to any war at all.
Without american help they could not make any single tank… Mass production of anything was totally foreign concept for the communists. Poland had stronger army than Russia at that time.
You Sir are simply ignorant of WWII realities.

An Anglophile to the core, ku kulx klan stooge Wilson didn't care about the fate of the Russians. His concern was in keeping German forces split along two fronts. The payoff worked: Russia's provisional prime minister Aleksandr Kerensky kept the Russians involved in the war.

In 1916, Woodrow Wilson was re-elected to the presidency chiefly on the strength of a slogan: "He kept us out of war." By 1917, the peacenik prez was leading the charge against Germany, jailing antiwar activists, and exhorting Americans to fight a "war to end all wars." In 1940, Franklin Delano Roosevelt told the voters: "I have said this before, but I shall say it again and again and again: your boys are not going to be sent into any foreign wars." Behind the scenes, however, he was maneuvering to do just that – and by the end of 1941, we were fighting a two-front war, embracing "Uncle" Joe Stalin as a fellow "anti-fascist," and planning the internment of the Japanese-American population.

Mr. Langer, you also forget that the Soviet Union had, by the end of 1939, invaded Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia, Poland and Finland. Their military was under-equipped and understaffed because of Stalin's paranoia and the Germans' destruction of USSR's industry in Barbarossa. When the Germans invaded in 1941, the USSR had millions of troops on the border. So they HAD a military, tanks, etc…and then US resources bailed them out for a while, yes.
But I agree with you that I don't think Stalin had it planned for Britain, France and Germany to duke it out until they were weak. His later acquisition of eastern Europe was opportunism.

Consider what happened after Nazi Germany was defeated … VERY substantially by the Red Army, at FAR more cost than the other allies against German militarism.

We will never know what might have happened if FDR had lived to help peace after WW2, so all we have to go on is such facts as that the "Truman Doctrine" immediately turned the Soviet Union into "the enemy" and threatened pre-emptive nuclear strikes.

I am well aware of Soviet defects – especially under Stalin – but it was Washington which created the "Cold War" and everything since which has caused conflict during my lifetime – approaching 70 years.

It never ends, does it!! The determination to destroy the USSR … more recently Vietnam, Iraq, Iran and so on.

700+ military bases around the world. CIA assassination squads. Name it and Washington does it, true terrorist style.

If America does not join in WWII, the Germans get the atomic bomb first and the consequences are that there is not a jew left in the world and the rest are slaves. And remember, it was Hitler that declared war in the United States. What were we supposed to do with that?

So "Without american help they could not make any single tank" That means that actually it was the americans that made the T34 for the russians…. (wonder why they didn't use it themselves, instead of those shermans and grants)
And Poland … a stronger army than Russia at the time – wow !!! I did not know this !!!
You, sir, should make a movie to enlighten the benighted masses !!! It would be entertaining !!!

While some of Pat Buchanan's views are way out in left field, you have to hand it to him that he is a sound scholar. His book was meticulously researched and the arguments he puts forth have merit. A previous book of his, on the issue of America: Empire or Republic", was equally well researched and highly educaitonal, even for those who do not always agree with his views. We also have to incorporate another issue. Pat being of Irish decent, reflects a broader attitude among Irish of his generation that definitely was anti-Brittain and pro-Germany, even before WW'II. I for one have learned a lot from his writings and am in very large part in agreement with the arguments he puts forth.

I wish Scott that you would bring even more scholars and writers on to discuss WW1–it is I think the pivotal event in world history in the last 100 years-with the possible exception of the development of nuclear weapons–I am puzzled by your selective skepticism with government–Wilson and Roosevelt may well have manueverd (?) us into WW1 and 2–there was government malefeasance and coverup in Waco and OK City Bombing–but you seem to be in the Noam Chomsky, Peter Lance, Wayne Barrett camp when it comes to the political assassinations of the 1960's and on 911–the lone nut and Al Qadi did it official version.

Hitler was not prepared for war???! Huh!!!!??
What revisionist NONSENSE !

Hitler did NOT know that Germany will be defeated in January 1942 !????! WTF ?!!!?
This Buchanan is FASCIST !
No wonder U.S. were supporting ALL FASCIST dictators in Nixon, Ford and Reagan times !
Such DISAPPOINTMENT this interview!

Valerianus:”…the Germans while secretly mobilizing the largest military force in human history to make a surprise attack on the exhausted European powers…”

Excuse me. In 1939 the German army was far away from being the largest military force in human history. In fact the weak numerical strength was one of the reasons it was strongly underestimated by its foes.

The invasion of Poland did hardly come as a surprise since Polish chauvinists did provoke the Germans already for a very long time.

The works of Gerd Schultze-Rhonhof like “Der Krieg der viele Vaeter hatte” would be a good reading, before debating anything relating to World War II.